Tag: fcc
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FCC: making a rulebook out of metaphors
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Andrew Orlowski
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Regulators and network operators across the world will be watching events unfold in Washington DC with some astonishment today, as the US telecoms industry becomes embroiled in a bureaucratic farce.
Late last week, the US regulator the Federal Communications Commission issued a landmark assertion of authority over how American operators should manage their networks – and announced a new policy framework. We won’t know what this policy framework will be for days or perhaps weeks – and the statements issued … Read More
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How Free Press breaks the citizens’ network
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Andrew Orlowski
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In 2003 the journalist Ron Suskind captured one of the quotes of the decade when he cited an unnamed Bush administration official as saying:
“When we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality, we’ll act again, creating other new realities.”
On the web today, “political activism” has become a virtual reality game that anyone can play, whoever you are. To succeed, a campaign need not be reality-based at all: it can generate its own fictional … Read More
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We sneer at your global standards, and your economies of scale…
by
Andrew Orlowski
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More dismal news for the US consumer. After the simultaneous failure of Municipal Wi-Fi projects in three major US cities – something we predicted four years ago – faster, cheaper mobile data looks further away than ever.
So why are Google lobbyists advocating for the next wave of collapsing wireless initiatives – rather than helping things?… Read More
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Smart radios are still pretty dumb
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Andrew Orlowski
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More than three years ago, your reporter got a good taste of how miserable technology utopians can be. It was at Intel’s Developer Forum in San Francisco, and the debate was about liberating analog TV spectrum for exciting new digital uses. The analog switchover is slated for February 2009.
On behalf of Microsoft, Google, and Intel, the technology evangelists argued that smart radios were here, but the evil regulator the FCC wouldn’t permit them to deploy the technologies. Broadcasters countered … Read More
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FCC opens door to ISP wipe-out
by
Andrew Orlowski
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Re-monopolizing the phone service
US telecoms regulator the FCC has signaled the end of the independent ISP, a move which will leave DSL provision concentrated in the hands of just a few large providers. The move, which turns local DSL provision from a regulated monopoly into an unregulated monopoly, also has repercussions for rural telephony providers, who will lose a chunk of subsidy, and has potentially chilling consequences for free speech.
Unless state regulators step into the void just vacated … Read More